The Speech
by AC.nelli
Summary: Hermione becomes the first female Minister of Magic, so Ron has to hold a speech about it. One-shot


_A/N: So..my first Harry Potter fic. __Give me some thoughts.. _

_I'm so screwed_.

This sentence was stuck like a mantra in his head ever since Kingsley talked him into this nonsense.

Who in his right mind would want him, Ron Weasley, to hold a speech? Sure, it was his wife that becomes the next Minister of Magic and she also will be the first female one. Which makes him the first husband to hold a speech about the new Minister.

But why couldn't they just skip this stupid tradition?

Not that he wasn't able to talk a lifetime about Hermione. But he sure wasn't ready to talk about her in front of half the Ministry, his entire family, a bunch of friends and not to forget these annoying press people.

Ron was fairly confident that he would say something stupid. He was Ron bloody Weasley after all and if anyone would describe him to a stranger this would be in his character description: Saying and doing stupid and/or inappropriate things.

Kingsley was about to end his speech and Ron knew that it will be mere seconds before he was called up to the stage.

_Oh Godric, please don't make me embarrass myself in front of my children. _

He thought back to this morning when his fifteen year old daughter made him a cup of tea to calm his nerves.

"_Don't worry, Dad. You will do just fine. And please eat something." Hugo said and shoved a slice of toast to him. He picked at it and even took a bite, mainly to appease his son._

_Hugo stared at him, determination and worry on his face. It never fails to amaze Ron, how much his son was like Hermione, both in looks and character. _

_Ron sighed and took another bite before shoving the plate away from him._

"_I' m sorry, buddy. Might eat this backwards if I'm having one more bite."_

_He sipped his sweet tea and wondered why the hell he was such a nervous wrack. It was the Quidditch games at Hogwarts all over again. _

_Ron thought he was over his insecurities, but old habits die hard, right?_

_Looking at his two children made him feel a tiny bit lighter though. They both got his ginger hair and freckled skin with the tendency to get burned easily when out in the sun. Hugo got the warm brown eyes of his mother, Rose Ron's blue orbs._

_Rose sat beside Ron on the kitchen table, sipping her own tea. She was already in her dress for the ceremony, her long wild locks pinned up at the nape of her neck. _

_She rarely touched her breakfast. _

_Ron knew she was feeling the same anxiety he felt. Two years ago, during summer break, Hugo told Ron that Rose never eats breakfast before a Quidditch match and even throws up sometimes._

_Rose was in many ways like him. She was funny, loved Quidditch, normally eats on behalf of a whole Quidditch team and had a temper similar to Ron's. Thank Godric, she got the brains of her mother. _

_None the less, she could easily comprehend what Ron was going through. _

"And now, ladies and gentleman, please welcome Ronald Weasley.", Kingsley announced and stepped back for Ron.

He took a deep breath before he finally entered the stage and went to the podium.

His family clapped excitedly in the front row, even cheering for him. He looked over to Hermione, who smiled and winked at him.

Of course, the whole Weasley family was there today to celebrate with Hermione. They were all sitting in the second and third row along with his parents-in-law, who looked both proud and just the tiniest bit nervous.

For a short second he feared that his impulsive decision from this morning to ditch his sorry attempts of the prepared speech, was probably the worst decision of his life, but when the applause died down, he hadn't much time to panic over it.

So, with a final deep breath and a look into Hermione's eyes, he started to speak.

"Th- thank you", he said after the applause died down and tried not to flinch about the noticeable tremble in his voice.

"Well, as tradition demands, I`m expected to hold a speech about our new Minister of Magic. Speeches are not exactly my strong point and, in all honesty, I dreaded this moment ever since Kingsley _asked_ me to hold it."

Ron threw a pointed look at the former Minister who just happened to have a sudden interest in the condition of his fingernails.

Over the soft laughter of the audience, Ron heard a snort and quickly located the source. Harry was smirking at him and Ron supressed the urge to flip the tosser off.

He hated The Daily Prophet with a passion, but for this headline he might forget about his principles for a day and actually buy this piece of garbage.

Nevertheless, he decided against it, mostly because he didn't fancy to be on the receiving end of some rather nasty hexes performed by his wife and mother.

"Some of you might be surprised to learn that I haven't prepared this speech during todays breakfast, but for the better part of the last weeks evenings. Though certainly not perfect, I thought the outcome was quite passable. But last night I went over my words and realized that I would tell you things about Hermione Jean Granger-Weasley that all of you already know. Actually, you could have found the better part of my words on a chocolate frog card.

Instead, I would rather tell you about the first day Hermione and I met."

As Ron let his gaze wander over to his family, he saw a smiling but slightly puzzled Hermione looking at him.

"The day I met Hermione was, of course, the very first day at Hogwarts. On the train ride I already met Harry Potter. You've probably heard about him at some point, saved the world or something like that. Anyway, in that train compartment Harry and I immediately became best friends and while we stuffed ourselves with a ton of sweets a girl opened the door to our compartment and asked us about the lost toad of a fellow student.

I was showing Harry a useless spell my _dear_ brothers told me about, that, of course, did not work. This girl though, performed an actual spell just perfect and informed us that she read every first years school book over the summer as preparation for our upcoming classes.

Sure enough, she outshined everyone in every class and there wasn't a teacher`s question she had no answer to.

Back than and especially on that first day I could never imagine to be friends with Hermione Granger. I thought that she had been a bossy know-it-all and on Halloween, two months after the first day at Hogwarts, she heard me calling her just that.

As an eleven year old boy, it never seemed possible to me that Hermione could be sincerely hurt by my words. But of course, it upset her. Very much.

I`ll never regret my words though, because this Halloween night was the beginning of a life-long friendship between me, Hermione and Harry.

If I hadn't said that in front of her, she would have never locked herself up in the bathroom to cry and Harry and I would have never ran to this said bathroom, because a mountain troll was wandering the halls of Hogwarts and Hermione was the only one who hasn't been warned about it.

Ever since the three of us beat that troll I could not imagine a good day without Hermione as a friend by my side. She still nagged us about doing our homework and scolding me for swearing too much and said things like _'Ron, it`s Hermione, Harry and I'_, but when I look back, the unhappiest times were when we didn´t speak to each other or when I wasn't able to talk to her."

He paused for a brief moment as surely the darkest time of his life came to mind, when he abandoned Harry and Hermione on the Horcrux hunt and was full of pure fear and hopelessness when he thought he would never see them again.

Or the weeks of Hermione being petrified, as he could still see this young red headed boy talking to her in the hospital wing and desperately wanting her to tell him off for staying out after curfew.

"Hermione did and achieved a lot of great things in her life. Most of these things you might already know, like her helping to defeat Voldemort and his Death Eaters or her success in freeing the house elves.

Although these are amazing and exceptionally brilliant achievements, Hermione is so much more than the brightest witch of our age and a war heroine.

Did you know that the beginnings of her efforts to free the house elves lay in our Hogwarts years? Back then, she started a campaign to free the house elves and it didn't stop her, that for a very long time, it had been a one-woman-movement.

Her courage and ambition to help the defenceless and her undying sense of justice are exceptional and even more admirable if you consider that as a Muggleborn, Hermione had been in great danger herself, but still looked out for others. And this is what she`ll continue to do as the leader of Wizarding Britain. She`ll continue to fight for a better life for everyone.

By the way, I once read an article about Hermione inheriting the title of the brightest with of our age. It said, that she sure is intelligent, but mainly book smart. If you ask me, a person who`s just book smart could never use the knowledge in real life right? Well, nothing could be further from the truth. Hermione`s quick thinking and brilliance at everything she does, saved Harry`s and my life more times than I care to admit. Even in the most dangerous and horrible situations she was in, her highest priority was to keep us safe."

_I was wrong. These were the darkest hours of my life_., Ron thought and Hermione`s screams echoed through his mind.

"Hermione saved me in more than one way. She taught me self-worth and confidence, which, especially as a teenager, I hadn't much of. She believed in me when I didn't believe in myself. She was there for me when I needed her the most. And the best thing of all: for some unbeknown reason she loves me, and in the end, this makes me the luckiest bloke in the world."

For the next words Ron looked only at Hermione, who gave up to hold back her tears for quite some time now.

"Befriending you had been the best thing I had ever done. I heard a lot of people say that they married their best friend. Well, I certainly did. We went through so many adventures -good and bad- together and I`m happy to say that the good ones outweigh the bad ones. I love you, Hermione and I`m ready for this next adventure to come our way."


End file.
